Kansas City's Guthrie shuts down Athletics

OAKLAND, Calif. — Raul Ibanez homered to break his own franchise record for oldest Royals player to clear the fences, and Kansas City beat the Oakland Athletics 1-0 on Friday night.

The Associated Press

OAKLAND, Calif. — Raul Ibanez homered to break his own franchise record for oldest Royals player to clear the fences, and Kansas City beat the Oakland Athletics 1-0 on Friday night.

The 42-year-old Ibanez connected in the fifth inning for his fifth homer, giving Jeremy Guthrie the lone run he needed for Kansas City's first victory at the Oakland Coliseum since April 10, 2012. The Royals went 1-5 against the A's last season, including 0-3 on the road.

Guthrie (7-9), an Ashland native, struck out six in six innings to win his second straight outing following a three-start skid as the Royals beat the team with baseball's best record for their third straight win and eighth in 10. It could get tougher today, when Jon Lester makes his A's debut two days after being traded by the Boston Red Sox.

The A's struggled to get anything going and lost for the third time in four games a day after trading slugging left fielder Yoenis Cespedes to the Red Sox for Lester and Jonny Gomes.

Sam Fuld started in center field and batted leadoff one day after returning to Oakland where he began the season following a trade from Minnesota. His leadoff double in the fourth was the first hit off fellow ex-Stanford player Guthrie.

Guthrie struck out the side in the sixth, retiring Brandon Moss and Jed Lowrie on consecutive called third strikes.

Sonny Gray (12-4) hung tough in a pitcher's duel with Guthrie. The right-hander struck out seven in seven innings and didn't walk a batter for the first time all year.

He had his five-start winning streak snapped with his first losing decision in eight outings dating to a June 13 home loss against the Yankees.

He had five or more strikeouts in each of his five July outings, going 5-0 with a 1.03 ERA for the month.

Orioles 2, Mariners 1

At Baltimore, Wei-Yin Chen won his fifth consecutive start and had a season-high eight strikeouts to lead the Baltimore Orioles to a win over the Seattle Mariners.

Baltimore has won nine of its past 11 games and remained atop the AL League East. An RBI single by Manny Machado in the third, snapped the Orioles' scoreless streak at 19 innings,

Chen (12-3) allowed one run and five hits with one walk over 71/3 innings. Andrew Miller, acquired from Boston on Thursday, pitched a scoreless eighth in his debut for the Orioles (61-47). Left-hander Zach Britton picked up his 22nd save.

Mariners left-hander Roenis Elias (8-9) allowed two runs and seven hits with seven strikeouts and one walk over 52/3 innings. It was his longest outing since June 28 against Cleveland.

National League

Giants 5, Mets 1

At New York, Ryan Vogelsong pitched a two-hitter for his second career complete game, Hunter Pence emerged from a deep funk with a triple and three RBIs and the Giants beat the Mets for their second straight win.

Vogelsong (6-8) faced 28 batters, one over the limit, allowing Juan Lagares' soft single leading off the sixth and Lucas' Duda's 20th homer to start the eighth. In ending a five-decision losing skid, he walked one and got two double plays. Vogelsong threw 102 pitches in the game that took 2 hours, 6 minutes.

Brandon Crawford had a run-scoring single, Matt Duffy an RBI single for his first big league hit and Pence added a two-run triple and RBI groundout off Jonathon Niese (5-7) for San Francisco.

Brewers 7, Cardinals 4

At St. Louis, Wily Peralta won his 13th game to tie for the National League lead and Aramis Ramirez powered the Milwaukee Brewers with a home run and RBI double off Cardinals ace Adam Wainwright.